Bellagio
Hours, Tables, Location Open 24/7. 28 tables, not including the 4 tables in the High Limit area or the 2 exclusive tables in Bobby's Room (super high rollers only). In the middle of the Las Vegas Strip, across the street from Paris Las Vegas. Bellagio is the site of the famous Big Game involving many of the poker world's luminaries. Games and Info Limit hold 'em: $4/$8 and $8/$16 are always running. $15/$30 and $30/$60 are often running. Higher limits (e.g. $60/$120, $100/$200, $500/$1000, $1000/$2000, and higher) are available upon request or on demand, with a separate board and brush in the center of the room. No-limit hold 'em: * $200-$500 buyin, $2/$5 blinds. * $400-$1000 buyin, $5/$10 blinds. * $800-unlimited buyin, $10/$20 blinds. Omaha/8: * $20/$40 runs often 7-Stud: * $20/$40 with $3 ante often runs * $40/$80 with $5 ante The rake is 0-10%, max rake is $4 at low limits. At the $4/$8, the rake is explicitly: $1 at $10 pot size, $2 at $30, $3 at $50, and $4 at $80. Posting: New players must post. Players coming in between the small blind and button in Hold'em games may buy the button. Shuffling: All tables have Shufflemaster machines. Wait Time The wait can be incredibly long on busy nights and evenings (an hour or more, even for low limits), and doesn't seem to ever be all that short. Strangely, for such a fancy, high-tech poker room that has plasma video screens on the outside listing things like the games they are willing to spread, they do not have a computerized board; the wait lists and the list of games actually in play are kept by hand on pieces of paper clipped to a clipboard by the brush. It's hard, therefore, to track where you are, and hard to do anything but hang around waiting while you're on the list. There are two brushes and two boards: games above $20/40 seem to be handled by the inner board and brush (a freestanding desk in the middle of the room), lower limit games are handled by the brush at the entrance to the room. Tournaments and Jackpots * Sun, Mon, Tue, Wed, Thu: 2pm, $500+$40 NLHE tournament. Single-table satellites to win entry start at 9am every morning for $130 buyin (top two winners get entry into the 2pm) * Fri, Sat: 2pm, $1000+$60 NLHE tournament. Single-table satellites to win entry start at 9am every morning for $240 buyin (top two winners get entry into the 2pm) There are no jackpots. Atmosphere The most upscale poker room in Vegas, possibly in the world. Aimed squarely at the ultra-high-roller. If you're there to play $4/$8 or $8/$16, the management can be very brusque; they don't seem to care if you play there or not - they're looking for the $200/$400 player, and you're not them. Higher limits like $1000/$2000 play in a separate slightly-raised area of tables labeled "high limit". Despite the problems with rather snooty managers, the players tend to be fairly bad at lower limits for some reason, making it attractive for good players. See the discussion thread under the Links section below. The room is nicely separated from the rest of the casino without being far away. It's next to the sportsbook (a common occurrence in higher-end casinos), and is sort of tucked away in its own little corner of the room in such a way that the smoke and noise of the main casino floor doesn't really come in much; it's merely present, without being intrusive. The poker room is walled not by full walls but by half-height walls that practically invite passersby to stop and lean on the rail and watch a game that's happening near the rail. If you're playing at such a table, you can invite your friends to watch from outside and they can root you on. The room itself is quite crowded: they've packed in every possible table they could into their limited space, and the nice-sized chairs also mean you're packed in at the individual tables. This can get a bit claustrophobic if such things worry you; there's really no space for you to push your chair back from the table and stretch, or get up to take a walk. To emphasize that they are aiming at the ultra-high-roller (as if it needed emphasis), they recently remodeled and built a separate sub-room in the poker room, called Bobby's Room (for Bobby Baldwin). You are not allowed in unless you've come to play $4000/$8000, minimum. This separate enclosed room is completely enclosed by glass and wood, and has its own separate bar and lounge area. There are chip runners, though they may be hard to flag down; you may also buy and sell chips yourself at the cashiers' cage in the back of the poker room. It's customary to tip the chip runners. Smoking: Non-smoking, and separate enough from the rest of the casino that very little smoke drifts in at all. Tables and Chairs: The best player chairs in Vegas, bar none: extremely comfortable, totally adjustable, wheeled office-style chairs with soft felt padding. Tables are gorgeous felt and padding with a clean commit line but strangely have no cup holders of any kind (no built-in ones in the padding, no slide-in ones). Drinks are to be kept just sitting on the felt as you play, which seems like a recipe for disaster during play, but then I'm not in charge. Service and Comps Excellent service despite the extremely cramped quarters in the room. The waitresses have trouble getting around in the crowd of players (as do the players!), but they are prompt and relatively cheerful when they do. They're also very pretty to look at. Sodas come in a reasonably large size. The strawberry julius is well done and delicious. There are no hourly comps offered. However, they do offer a poker room rate for the hotel itself (call the poker room for details). Chip colors These are standard Las Vegas colors, except for the $10 and $20: *$1 - blue *$5 - red *$10 - orange with blue and green *$20 - yellow with purple and green *$25 - green with black *$100 - black with peach, white, and purple *$500 - purple *$1000 - yellow with purple and green Links * Official Bellagio Website * Table Tango Blog - Linda G's inside scoop on the goings-on at the Bellagio poker room * Bellagio discussion thread (2+2) - criticism of the attitude toward customers *http://forumserver.twoplustwo.com/showflat.php?Cat=0&Number=8872364&an=0&page=0&gonew=1#UNREAD Visited by wiki authors Visited by MarkT in Mar 2006.